


When Your Favorite Color Becomes Blue

by nighttimesympathies



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Kageyama is on the Autism spectrum, M/M, Oikawa is well you'll find out, Polyamorous Kageyama, This did not go as planned, Tsukishima is Complicated, bring on the drama, get ready for heartbreak, hinata has anxiety, the first chapter anyway
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-08
Updated: 2018-03-18
Packaged: 2019-03-28 10:47:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 10
Words: 9,362
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13902444
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nighttimesympathies/pseuds/nighttimesympathies
Summary: Kageyama Tobio and Hinata Shouyou have been dating for six months. They help each other live day by day with the everyday trials and tribulations of being on the spectrum and having severe anxiety, respectively. On top of that, there's the ever-present devotion to their team. And then comes the volunteering at the animal shelter. In Kageyama's POV.





	1. Sometimes the Truth Hurts

**Author's Note:**

> Hello, readers.
> 
> This is the beginning of something close to my heart. We'll see where it goes. Hope you enjoy.

“I’m leaving early today.”

It’s as if I’ve died and resurrected my own ghost. My teammates stare at me aghast.

When it’s this quiet, the gym morphs into a surreal imitation of limbo, a vacuous waypoint between the living and the dead.

My happy place.

“Hold the fuck up, Kageyama. Are you actually going to study?” Tanaka nudges me in the shoulder. Wincing, I watch his shoulders stiffen with a phantom impact. I shake my head.

“Figures.” Rolling his eyes, Tsukishima’s fingers graze the net.

An urge to smash his glasses gurgles up my throat like bile. He’s lucky the net stands between us.

“Hinata come by yet?” I say.

A numb silence echoes through the enormous gym. Tanaka and Tsukishima exchange a heavy gaze.

Once again, I’m the stupid one.

“Don’t worry, man.” This time, Tanaka loops his arm around my shoulder. “He had something to deal with. He probably didn’t want to worry you.”

Ignoring his trembling, I shove him into the net, knocking him into Tsukishima’s reluctant embrace.

“Fuck right off, both of you.” So much for my mental mantras. Fat lot of good they do. “You promised you’d find me the minute Hinata had another panic attack.” My flat voice, capable of frightening strangers, shreds my throat raw. _Why does this keep happening?_

“How can we trust an emotionally constipated autistic to help him?” Tsukishima’s glasses steam with a boiling rage.

A flippant response flits through my head and prepares to launch. Swallowing it down, I barrel past him, flinching when Tanaka attempts to wrench me back.

“Let him go,” Tsukishima says. “Hinata’s bigger than us.”

To my astonishment, no argument comes to mind.

For once, he’s right about me.


	2. I Remembered Why I Love You (Again).

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kageyama and Hinata prepare to do something challenging (for one of them, at least).

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello,
> 
> We've reached chapter 2. Yay! This is going to be pretty poetic at times (lots of times). You'll get the idea. Also, blue is definitely a huge theme, given the title. Also in terms of plot, it's not going to be super prominent in the way of "Action" and "Drama." Think of it as more of an intense seinen manga or a slice of life anime with a darker side.
> 
> Thank you for reading.

Rain thrashes the windows in slanting streaks, dappling the dark hallway in eerie shadows. I breathe in and out, pretend that it helps, will the blood in my fists to return to my veins and circulate in a rhythmic flow. I think about how good it feels to hug Hinata, to craft an illusion of safety incapable of fracturing. The warmth of his lips on mine. The music of his laughter.

“Hey.” It boggles the mind, how one word can fulfill your need of a home.

Hinata steps out of the bathroom, unsure of where his feet may take him. Sweat drenches his forehead, his hair stuck in wet clumps. Tears dry on his cheeks as he smiles up at me.

“It happened again,” he says. Bundling him in my arms, I breathe in the scent of his hair. Massaging his shoulders, I pull him apart from me.

“Next time, we’ll move through it together.” Standing on tiptoe, he kisses me, featherlight. Pressing him into my chest, I lean on his forehead.

We need not speak. Silence soothes. It sings its own songs.

We walk hand in hand down the rain-splattered hallway, the lullaby of the typhoon suspending us in an otherworldly daze. For the whole day, I’ve alternated between a nightmare and the kind of dream where no one speaks but everything is indescribably lush and perfect, like a master’s watercolor.

Hinata squeezes my hand. “I love you so much, Tobio,” he says. “I’m a mess, and you’re giving me a chance, and I’m afraid I’m on my way to ruining it.”

They rush over me, the waves, submerging me in a suffocating tumult until I’m drowning in my inability to speak. Words roll in cascading rapids over my head. In a desperate attempt to reach the surface, I meet his eyes.

“I’m not going anywhere.”

 _You’re a possessive shithead._ The voice in my head vibrates, ringing in my ears like a tuneless church bell. Telling it to shut up only sometimes helps. Most of the time, it does what it wants.

“Your head bitching at you again?” Somehow Hinata always knows when the voice is at its worst.

“You know it,” I say. He rolls his eyes. When he does it, he only shows annoyance, no sign of meanness.

“Don’t listen.” To him, it’s something with an off and on switch. Not so.

“Let’s change the subject,” I say. “I don’t want to go to the shelter today.” All the scratches up and down my arms testify to my inadequacy. Cats do not like me. I have adjusted to this solemn truth with admirable resignation. Hinata, however, is not so easily persuaded.

“Would it help if I went with you today, Tobio?” I think about the team being short of one player, a vital player, the need for him tantamount to a fluid arrangement. My absence, I know, is already dealing a blow to our captain’s vision. The vision I went about constructing. I invalidate my own accomplishments. What do they matter when you’re a prodigy?

“Yes,” I say. He kisses my hand.

We fetch his umbrella and mine from his locker. The deluge swarms around us in a fierce torrent.


	3. The Regicide of the King of Cats

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading.

Past Sakanoshita Market, a bit of a ways down the mountain road, stands Yazawa Animal Shelter. A nondescript sign with a white dog's and a black cat’s faces intertwined dangles from a rusted hook in front of a smudged sliding door. I’ve seen yakuza in here with their pets. It’s got that way about it, the musty aroma of history encapsulated, unmoving.

Shutting his umbrella, Hinata dumps it in a crooked metal stand by the door. He smiles at the young woman behind the front desk, her eyes shining behind her oversized purple glasses.

“Hello, Tobio-kun,” she says, fingering the silky tendrils of her dark ponytail. I scratch the back of my head. Hearing my first name come from the mouth of a near stranger sets me on a precipice of doom.

“I’m Kanako,” the young woman says, smiling at Hinata. “Has Tobio-kun told you what he does here?” Aside from bathing the cats and playing with the kittens, I do a whole lot of nothing. I’ve shared the bare minimum with Hinata, preferring to suffer through my upheavals in lugubrious silence.

“Think I’ve got the gist,” he says. Her laughter like wind chimes, Kanako leads us through a wooden door behind the front desk. Cats assembled in spacious square quarters peer out at us from their dim depths, their appearances running the gamut of approachable to malicious.

At once, Yuzuru, named for the beloved figure skater Yuzuru Hanyu, pounces onto Hinata, digging his claws into his shoulder and purring like a revving car engine. The elegant swath of his long black tail trails down his back, swishing like the pendulum of a clock. His bright blue eyes sear into mine, half of his face shining snow white, the other a penumbra of a crescent moon.

“None of that, Mr. Hanyu,” I say, taking him into my arms. Hissing, he drags his claw across my shoulder, commanding me to unhand him. I loosen my grip around his plunging white belly and deposit him into his sleeping quarter, swearing. He curls his tail around his legs, purring demurely.

“You’re learning,” Kanako says. “It takes time.” Squeezing my hand, Hinata inclines his head.

“You should wash that scratch up,” he says. “I’ll take it from here.” Squeezing him back, I peer down at my shoulder. He’s drawn blood, the ingrate. Glaring at the cat, I slide out of the room, perching outside the door to hear Hinata ask about the bathing ritual.

In the bathroom, I breathe, reminding myself what planted me in this predicament in the first place.

Animals and I have tolerated one another’s existence in the manner of a popular kid negotiating with an obsequious follower. For years, I’ve catapulted myself over hurdles to rectify the biblical adversity between us. I finally summoned up the courage to start volunteering at the shelter this year.

Out of my circle, only Hinata knows the real reason I leave practice early on Wednesdays. So far, we’ve done a solid job of keeping the secret between us. Admittedly, if it were to come out that the foremost prodigy of Karasuno’s volleyball team spends (some of) his idle hours playing with kittens, it wouldn’t taint my reputation.

In regards to my relationship with Hinata, that’s when shit would hit the fan.

Ruminating over the consequences of our illicit relations being laid bare beneath the limelight, I reemerge to find Hinata cradling a sleeping Yuzuru in his arms. Standing over the tub, sleeves rolled up, bangs pressed back with an industrial clip, he’s the picture of heartwarming diligence.

_I want nothing more than to plough you into oblivion._

Jesus. I need more sleep.

“I’m ready!” Hinata says, winking. Behind him, Kanako laughs, assembling the various containers of dandruff eliminator and conditioner on a plush sea foam towel laid across a small plastic table. Handing me an oversized sky blue shirt, she smiles as I draw it over my head.

“I’ll help you out,” I say, bending over beside Hinata and filling the tub with lukewarm water, leaving the drain plug open. Slipping a pair of cotton gloves into my hand, Kanako pats me on the back. Nodding, I pull the gloves on, smacking them against my hands, relishing in their elasticity. Laughing, Hinata’s cheeks flush scarlet.

“You can put Yuzuru in the tub now,” I say, gesturing towards the sudsy vessel. Nodding, Hinata lowers the cat into the water, marveling at Yuzuru’s sublime aura of calm. A familiar song, a theme from a retro anime, streams from the speakers of the radio beside the table.

“Sailor Moon,” Hinata says, smiling at Kanako.

“We always play three songs to time the bath.” Kanako pulls a robin’s egg blue apron from the shelf beneath the table and wraps it from behind. “It helps Tobio-kun out.” Never mind that I’d rather listen to my own music. I appreciate the sentiment. That’s what matters.

“Can you pass me the shampoo, Hinata?” I say. Darting over to the table, he grabs a dented bottle of Dermalyte from the towel. Taking it from his hand, I curl my fingers around his wrist, digging into his pulse.

“You two are close, I take it,” Kanako says.

Dropping my hand, I immerse myself in my task. Looping the hand-held cord of the shower along my arm, I graze the nozzle down Yuzuru’s back. With my free hand, I work the shampoo into my palm, spreading it into a generous lather with my fingers.

“We’ve been best friends for ages,” Hinata says, a heaviness in his voice, the accumulated weight of love. I smooth the lather through Yuzuru’s fur, guiding the nozzle up his back and between his ears.

A second song thrums from the speakers, this one a contemporary pop song from a girl band. I thread the soapy streams of shampoo between the cat’s claws, suspending the nozzle over his head. I’m careful to not allow the shampoo entry into the cat’s eyes, nose or mouth, owing to the discomfort of such an assault. Once I’ve finished with the front claws, I rotate to the back, sliding the nozzle down his nimble back legs. Funnels of soap run in translucent streams down my arms. I almost gasp when Yuzuru burrows his head in my hand.

“Are you gonna keep this up?” Hinata says. Song number three starts playing, a slower number, an enka ballad from the 60’s. I wrench the faucet off.

“If you keep coming, I’ll stay on.” Yuzuru bounds out of my grasp, tiring of the tub. His eyes, beseeching, implore me to swaddle him. “Can you get me a towel from the table, Hinata?” I say. He zooms towards the folded violet towel tucked beneath the conditioner and tosses it to me. In an instant, Yuzuru is situated in a comfortable binding like a newborn babe, softly purring against my chest.

“I get the feeling you two are way more than friends,” Kanako says. Hinata’s breath hitches.

“What the fuck do you care?” In my arms, Yuzuru wrestles with my grip, aware of my blooming wrath. My head bubbles, popping with the crackling flames of rage. Hinata stares at me, eyes gobstopper wide in mute astonishment.

“I only care about what you do here,” Kanako says. “About your treatment of the animals.” She folds her arms close to her chest, flipping her ponytail back. A hardened resolve settles in her eyes. Her jaw sharpens. “If you’re going to talk to me like that, though, I’m going to ask that you leave.” Removing the towel from Yuzuru’s docile bulk, I return him to his sleeping quarter. Pretending not to notice the startled glimmer in his eyes requires a degree of self-control I had hitherto thought dormant.

“Fine by me,” I say. Hinata opens his mouth, willing a response to come out. I grab his hand. “We’ll see ourselves out.”

Outside the sliding door of the shelter, Hinata rips himself free from my grip.

“I hate it when you’re like this. School doesn’t have to follow us everywhere we go. You don’t have to be afraid here.”

“Not true, and you know it.” His eyes flit to the scummy water trickling into the gutter alongside the street. In these moments, his diminutive frame stands in stark contrast to the sheer enormity of the world and its constant abuses.

“You’re always the one who’s affectionate in public,” he says. Fixing me with a hard glare, he steps towards me. “Why don’t you stop?”

 _Because I can’t_. The words die on my tongue.

Turning away, I hurry down the familiar mountain road. Behind me, his silence hangs in the air like a stagnant summer breeze.


	4. You're Different At Night

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is definitely a shorter and more poetic chapter.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading.

The sleeplessness returns.

Closing my eyes reinforces my perception of an unfurling world, rubbing the crust of dreams from its eyes, stepping onto the dew-trodden grass.

Fragmented crystals of light squiggle in the corners of my vision. I think of Hinata, tucked up in bed, cozy in a nest of nightly thoughts. Praying that thoughts of me cease to torment him, I rouse myself from my bed, throw on my sweatpants hanging from the back of my desk chair and tug on my sweatshirt. As they are wont to do at this hour, the sidewalks beckon me to haunt their uneven pathways.

Biting into my bones, the early autumn wind rushes through the thin fibers of cotton. I stare at the twinkling expanse of stars, wondering how many others are doing the same. I think of Hinata’s eyes, too bright to contemplate, two radiant jewels calcified into ageless beacons of hope.

My stomach echoes with a desperate yawn. Eating has not occurred to me since our parting. If I know him (and I do, better than anyone), he’ll call me at a quarter to five and remind me to eat some breakfast before meeting me by Sakanoshita.

But I’m not expecting him to remember, much less to grace me with his presence.

Crying helps. Shedding tears of any kind, the ones of the self-serving variety or the genuinely mournful, the kind that dehydrate you and leave a taste in your throat, all of them help in some way.

And then the sadness comes. The raw plentitude of it that you have no way to arm yourself against, that robs you of any attempt to combat it with its sheer annihilation of the self and the strings holding you aloft.

Submitting to its control, I surrender.

No point in going to school. What’s another class down the drain, anyway.


	5. A Reckoning

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Full speed ahead with the drama.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We are now at the halfway point. It's definitely going to get way more dramatic from here on out. Perhaps less poetry and more chapters like this. We'll wait and see. Get ready for more characters, too. And, of course, thank you. so. much. for reading.

Reunited at practice, Hinata and I launch ourselves into our usual fluid, flowing strategy.

I set the ball; he soars.

I jump; he defies the boundaries of the air.

A devil and his pitchfork; Neptune and his trident.

Independent of thought, our bodies dance to the rhythm built into the grinding cogs of our souls.

We shut down in an effort to open up unto one another.

Mid-leap, he smiles, eyes shut in dazed wonderment.

“I adore you.”

Regret slashes my gut in the form of Hinata slamming to the floor, staring at me, mouth opening and closing in mute horror.

“At long last,” Tsukishima says, smirking, looming over the opposite side of the net, “our king takes his concubine.”

Reddening, I clench my fists. Filling my mouth, the vindictive taste of blood floats up to my nostrils.

“I’m not a fuckboy.” Smoothing static fibers from his shorts, Hinata pulls himself to his feet. “Tobio’s my boyfriend.”

Snorting, Tsukishima raises a discerning eyebrow at me. “So it’s Tobio now, huh,” he says. Cracking my knuckles, I roll my shoulders, bouncing on my heels.

“Sorry, but I’m not close enough with you to call you Kei,” Hinata says. Before he can finish, Tsukishima cuts into him.

“Don’t you have enough to deal with as is, Kageyama? Why do you have to be autistic _and_ gay?” Blinking, I splutter out a laugh. Is there a stupider question in existence?

“Because he’s choosing to live with himself.” Something on the edge of breaking cracks in Hinata’s voice.

“He’s definitely not choosing to answer his own questions,” Tsukishima says, glaring at me. “I bet you could live without being autistic, Tobio-chan. But dick, well.” He snorts out a laugh. “That’s another story.”

It happens so fast, I’m only aware of the strain on my body afterwards. One minute, I’m lunging, the next I’m crushing Tsukishima’s collar in my hand, his windpipe beating against my fingers like the wings of a flightless bird.

“Don’t ever call me that again.” My voice, a string stretched taut, reverberates through the deafening silence of the gym. His eyes flash, the vestiges of my threat stiffening his bones. We stare at one another with the chilling passivity of seeing the other’s life stretched out, fully lived, and finding them wanting.

“For God’s sake, Tobio, put him down.” Hinata’s voice, strangled with fear, plunges me back into the shockingly cold rapids of reality. Dropping my grip, I ignore the bedraggled spectacle Tsukishima makes of himself on the floor, instead striding towards Hinata, already envisioning the steaming meal for two of Chinese buns I’ll buy on the way home.

“Let’s invite Tsukishima to the shelter,” he says.

At long last, I’ve driven my boyfriend mad.


	6. Safest When Drowning

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> New character alert. Danger. Danger. Proceed with caution.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Take the above summary at face value.

"What the hell were you thinking, Hinata?" Cornered against a bathroom stall's unhinged door, he blushes, eyes flitting back and forth.

 "You don't have to get angry. I thought we could see what Tsukishima's like in a nurturing environment." You fell in love with his naivete, I remind myself, kneading my head.

 "What makes you think he'll be any less of an asshole at the shelter?" Kissing my knuckle, Hinata's eyes burn with an amber glimmer.

 "He loves animals, Tobio. Haven't you noticed?"

 In passing, I had noted his keen awareness of the fauna traversing the roadside on long bus rides, his studious perusal of scholarly articles on paleontology on his phone when he thought no one noticed, and his command over any conversation related to the goings on of pets. As far as he was concerned, he knew our team's household blessings better than themselves.

 "Guess I forgot," I say, slumping against Hinata's curving body. Heat emanating from his cheeks wakens my longing, raw and deepening by the minute. Sweat on his arms coats my skin as I draw him to me, lashing my tongue up and down his neck.

 "Not here," he says, half of his mouth curled in a devious smirk. Eliminating the gap between our vessels of passion, he kisses me; I wrangle with his shorts, the movements a beloved tune played on yellowed piano keys, second only to breathing in familiarity.

 "Isn't this lovely." Pushing his open palms into my chest with a torrent of strength, Hinata grips my shoulders and turns me to face Tsukishima.

 "If what you've seen leaves this room, and I hear about it," I say, "I'm not above cutting you." It’s old news to me, my scaring people shitless, my acquiring lurid rumors at every gymnasium we visit. You gotta pick the right times to weave your spell into reality.

 "I'm good at keeping secrets," Tsukishima says. "Ask Yamaguchi. Actually, don't; he'll freak out. But he's my best friend, and he speaks well of me."

 Yamaguchi talks of nothing but his favorite bespectacled ass. Oftentimes, I ponder asking him for whom he lives, Tsukishima or himself.

 "Best friends aside," Hinata says, stepping out from behind me, "want to volunteer with us today?" Sniffing, Tsukishima arches his back against the row of sinks.

 "It's Thursday. I thought you two only go on Wednesdays." Hinata smiles, brimming with unbridled joy. Groaning, I pace the length of the stalls.

 "We're making an exception today. I'm betting Kanako will love a new face in the cat room." Turning on my heel, I throw up my hands.

 "You're assuming she's wholeheartedly forgiven my fuckup." Tutting, Tsukishima folds his arms.

 "What has our dearest Tobio-chan done now?" My shoes squeak on the blinding white tile as I swerve to meet him.

 "I distinctly remember telling you not to fucking call me that." Acidic, my voice rattles through me, a feral thing.

 "Then what the hell else do I call you?" Tsukishima says, his glasses flaring. Scrunching his mouth up in a reluctant pout, Hinata spreads his arms between us, stretching out his legs in a school crossing guard's stance.

 "How about we go back to using our last names like boring people and hurry up? The more we bicker, the more time we waste." You're the victim, not the perpetrator, Hinata. Entwining my hand with his, I breeze past Tsukishima, throwing my head over my shoulder.

 "It's a long walk," I say. Rolling his eyes, Hinata tickles the ridges of my palm.

 "I can smell the bullcrap from here." Sighing, I shrug my shoulders. Tsukishima whips his phone out from his turtleneck sweater's front pocket, immediately engrossing himself in a fiercely intelligent article. In a daze of intent, we wind through the front hall of school, bolting through the front entrance into the welcoming chill of a blazing autumn day.

 The mountain road meanders along quiet lawns, hushed houses darkened with inactivity. Fluttering garments swirl in the wind on lines stretched between trees. Classmates zoom down the road on bikes, occasionally stopping to chat. I keep my distance, all too aware of their insipid desire to cut into the truth of my deportment. I deem them unworthy, and they know it.

 "Would it actually kill you to humor them?" Tsukishima says. Not waiting for an answer, he scrolls through the troublingly small text of another dense article.

 "You'd love that, wouldn’t you? I'll keep frightening them away, in that case." He snorts.

 "You're the worst."

 Tugging my hand, Hinata points across the silent street. Sitting on the kerb in front of the shelter, Kanako sucks on a giant rainbow lollipop, her eyes shielded from the sun behind a pair of stylish Ray Ban's. At the sight of us, she springs to her feet, pocketing the sucker in the front pocket of her wrinkled apron. Suppressing a grunt of disgust, I cough, averting my eyes.

 "We're back," Hinata says, guiding me forwards.

 "And I'm glad." Swiping off her sunglasses, Kanako looks to me, then Tsukishima, then back to me. "You picked the perfect day to bring a friend along, Tobio-kun. We're in a bit of a pickle."

 Somehow, this announcement reduces my never once and not currently considering Tsukishima my friend a moot point. Nor, to my astonishment, does he argue her wording. Hinata, for his part, smiles with enough gusto to strain the capacity of his face.

  _I treasure that smile; it's for me alone, after all._

 I freeze, the voice in my head rocking me on my heels. When did I become so possessive?

 "How can I help?" Tsukishima says. His phone nowhere in sight, he rolls up the sleeves of the sweater. Assessing the layout of the shelter through his eyes, I imagine how it must look to him, the oaken walls steeped in rich history. Pamphlets advertising animal welfare are splayed in haphazard piles across the front desk. Framed beside the door to the cat room, a poster announces all possible inhabitants welcome in the shelter. Overstuffed recliners border a table piled high with ancient issues of Shonen Jump in the corner. It reminds me of seeing people in convenience stores sneaking quick peeks at the latest manga posted in the freshly inked pages.

 "Well," Kanako says, "do you have any prior experience with pills, Mr. Handsome Glasses?" Tightening my grip on Hinata's hand, I listen to my breathing. The first and last time I worked a pill down a cat's throat, the menace drew blood so deeply, the wound became infected with bacteria from her claw.

 "Yeah, actually," Tsukishima says. "I've helped out any number of times with thyroid medicine." The specificity, coupled with the consistency, speaks of repeated visitations Tsukishima makes to a pet's dwelling. I wonder, not for the first time, about the words Yamaguchi leaves unspoken.

 "Terrific." Propping the back door open, Kanako ushers us into the cat room, one by one. As I step over the threshold, she pulls me into a loose embrace.

 "I'm so glad you came back," she says, her voice muffled against my chest. Hanging my arms at my sides, my arms tingle, my mind racing with inarticulate currents of thought. My mouth shut in a tight grimace, I shut my eyes against the tumult in my head.

 "He doesn't like hugs. You'd best let him go." Tsukishima, arms forming a fortress of comfort around an imperial Maine coon, throws me a sympathetic frown. Mouth flapping open like a goldfish, I stagger backwards. Giggling, Hinata rights my posture and hands me my sky blue shirt.

 "We bathing like usual?" he says. Shaking her head, Kanako twirls a ribbon of her dark hair around her finger.

 "You two will stand guard and make sure your friend doesn't get attacked by Her Royal Highness over there." By HRH, she means Andromeda, the frightening monarch three years into her reign of the shelter. Tufts of thick white fur shed across Tsukishima's bare arms, feathery strands of a royal brown brushing the crooks of his elbows

 Cooing, Hinata reaches to stroke her head.

 " _Don't_." Murder in his eyes, Tsukishima once again rests his gaze on the Maine coon, her head now bent in startled submission, ears tucked closed. "If there's anyone beneath my contempt besides our king," he says, "it's the cretins who get off from abusing animals." Though my offense at him lumping me alongside those sick sons of bitches knows no bounds, I find myself nodding.

 "Amen," Hinata says, voice solemn with reverence.

 Clearing the sea foam green towel free of bathing bottles, Kanako gestures to a cylinder of pills on top of the boom box. Marked Andromeda's Thyroid Medicine, it's packed to the brim with dark pink capsules.

 Meeting her eyes, Tsukishima lowers the aging cat onto the towel. Swaddling her in the soft folds of the fabric, he reaches for the pills. Pushing the cap off, he stares at me, tilting his head.

 "What." Craning the cat's neck up with a gentle touch, he pours one pill into his open hand before swiftly popping it into her mouth. Enclosing her mouth with his hands, he watches her swallow, his gaze narrowed.

 "Please keep coming." As one, we turn to Kanako, her cheeks flushed scarlet. "At least until her owner arrives. He's supposed to adopt her sometime this week."

 Summoned by her words, the door squeals open, revealing a slender young man in an immaculate white blazer with impeccably coiffed hair the color of the finest chocolate. My stomach drops to my feet.

 "Since when do you show your face round these parts, Oikawa?" Glaring, Tsukishima scratches Andromeda under her chin. The young man smirks.

 "How can I not pick up my new pet?" he says, voice liquid ice. I will myself to memorize his expression, a sudden drowning sensation enveloping me whole.

 "Hey." Speaking in a near whisper, Hinata fingers the coarse fabric of my blazer. "Didn't you two date?"

 A vision of the floor caving in on itself, decomposing into mold beneath my feet and swallowing me in a rotting chasm, whirls through my head. Reeling, I trip forward, the world slanting on its axis.

 Catching me in both arms, Oikawa bites his lip.

 "What am I going to do with you, Tobio-chan?" he says.

 

* * *

 

To say we dated is an understatement.


	7. Oikawa. Or, My First Love.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I'm especially proud of this chapter.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thus begins the second arc of this story. I have other fics planned to follow this one, a crossover with another sports-themed series and a dark fantasy. I've started the crossover and am drafting the fantasy. So there will be more on the way from me.

I first met Oikawa Tooru when he saved my life. Or I saved his. Later, resting in my arms, he assured me he’d dreamt of our meeting. I came to expect these proclamations from him, signs from the stars, messages shorn from the playful wisdom of dreams.

He worshipped the sky and with it the allure of magical thinking.

On the night we met, storm clouds goaded one another in a godly race. Downpours taunted us with occasional sprinklings. We were on a field trip with a friendly high school to a well-known shrine near the Asakusa market stalls in Tokyo and had stopped in Hakata for an emergency bathroom break.

Shifting from foot to foot near the parked bus, I overheard my classmates, fellow third years, complaining about underground stalls: toilet paper on the floor, sinks reeking of stale vomit and a strange man looking on. I preferred to study our surroundings. The skyscrapers, monolithic monuments to modernity and monotony, wove their immensity through the heavens. Eerie orbs of light cast from towering streetlights shone on the slate slabs of concrete, so quiet it pierced the idle onlooker with dread.

“Well, _I’m_ not holding it.” A boy, a high schooler and an upperclassman I’d passed any number of times walking to and from the gym after volleyball practice, practically ran down the harshly lit stairwell. His command and precision on the court transfixed me.

Taking comfort in at least the presence of someone besides myself, I followed.

My foot hadn’t passed over the threshold before a hand wound clammy fingers around my wrist and dragged me me into a darkened stall. My pants dropped to my feet under dry hands. Numb, I shut my eyes against the assault of sweet decay wafting from the man’s breath. Laughter, ghoulish and expressionless, sounded in my ears. A bloom of pain then, rioting with a hurt unknown to me. Moons blackened my vision. I screamed.

Jackknifing the door from its hinges, the boy from the court caught my attacker in the throat with the back of his hand, watching with vacant eyes as the man slammed his head against the stained rim of the toilet.

Leading me around the shoulders, my guardian followed me up the stairwell, my classmates swarmed in a chattering huddle around the entrance, grabbing for me, bursting with questions.

“Don’t touch him,” the boy said, keeping me close with a hesitant drag of his fingers on my shoulder. “Give him space.” Clinging to his hand, I looked him square in the eye, hoping he heard my words on the wind. “You’re with me, Tobio-chan.” I held him then, so safe in the cocoon of his assurance that I didn’t bother asking how he knew my name.

* * *

 

But then of course, my identity was common knowledge among the elite, the expert practitioners of their craft. Tooru had kept an eye on me, he said on the bus ride home, anticipating my meteoric rise over volleyball’s myriad disciples. Kitagawa Daichi possessed an indomitable spirit. At its heart, he knew, I pulsed in overdrive. Throughout my middle school years, I ascended through the invisible ranks of legends, eclipsing even myself and earning an infamous nickname.

“The King of the Court.” Hearing it from Tooru’s lips, I burrowed my head against the seat, reddening in shame. “Hey.” Massaging my head, the smooth pads of his fingers rotating in rhythmic circles, he spoke into my hair. “It’s better to care too much than not enough.”

Head massages helped me cool my nerves. He must have watched when Iwaizumi-san introduced these massages to me, intimating that they helped his friends with atypical brain functioning carry on.

Holding fast his hand, I buried my face in his neck. “Teach me,” I said. His scent, overpowering, hinting at a beguiling array of roses, snapped on a determined switch in me.

“Indeed.” Resting my hand in his lap, he turned my palm to the ceiling, admiring the faint tracery of my veins with his finger. “Loosen up; that’s number one. You and I need to have some fun.”

Grasping his hand, I snuck one long finger into my mouth, sucking him down hard. Raising a shrewd eyebrow, he bit back a shrill moan.

“This your idea of fun, then?” Blinking, I ducked my head, this time reddening for an entirely different reason.

“Wait till I’m through with you, my Ozymandias, my King of Kings.”

* * *

 

We wrote out our itinerary on an old Mac in the library, pausing to watch NicoNico videos with enormous headphones. In order to adapt the mindset of a skilled setter, one with a complete knowledge of the assets each of their teammates possessed, Tooru insisted one needed an education on the favorable qualities of their culture.

“Iwa-chan says it’s ridiculous, us doing this.” Awash in the possibilities of our imminent journey, my head in his lap, I sighed in contentment. “I countered with wondering what’s so insane about exploring your home? You can’t live without belonging, can you, Tobio-chan?”

I drew his face down to my lips and kissed him. The taste of his mouth in mine, sweet and sharp with a shock of mint and dark chocolate, cast me adrift in a heady storm of desire.

“I belong to you,” I said. He laughed, rubbing my belly.

“Nope. You belong to no one but yourself.” In the presence of upperclassmen, though, Iwaizumi-san excluded, Tooru gravitated toward me with the steel-eyed instinct of a mother bear protecting a wayward cub.

Enmeshed in his net of safekeeping, I turned over onto my belly and allowed him to straddle me for the first time. Until that night, I had kept busy warming him through the night with my love. In matters of lovemaking, I became a quick study under his tender guidance.

After he pleasured me, I sat differently in my skin, having aged through considerable years in minutes.

We didn’t leave the school that night.

* * *

 

He took me back to Asakusa first, on a weekend. Big mistake.

Surging crowds, tourists packed in teeming blobs surrounding the crammed stalls sent me into the throes of a dizzying panic. We sought refuge in a hole in the wall nearby, the windows misted from the steam of foot-warming vents built beneath the low-set tables. We shared okonomiyaki, him showing me how one assembled the ingredients provided on the heated platform into an omelette with wedged metal tongs, me looking on, wishing for a bottle to encapsulate this moment so that I could forever drink it down and dream.

We then journeyed to Kamakura on a mostly empty train, save for a lively pack of tourists scrunched in the center of the car. On the sidewalks that wound through the business district near the sacred Buddha, we stopped in the beloved Ghibli store. Swept into a netherworld of lofty enchantment, I marveled at the luminous craftsmanship of the man at the helm, a man Tooru deemed the godfather of Japanese animation.

“You need to watch his films sometime,” he said.

Toying with a bell strung around the neck of an inquisitive black cat, I quirked my mouth in a smirk. “Do we have a date?”

Plucking the cat from my hand, Tooru inspected the price on its tail.

“I’m buying you this,” he said. “And you choose the movie.”

Wrapping him in my arms, I kissed him as though I expected the wind to carry him off, scattering the detritus of him in its wake.

“I’m with you for the long haul,” he said, searching my eyes. Then, swearing, he scrambled out of the store, taking the cat with him.

After tearing him back and apologizing to the woman behind the cash register and paying for Jiji (for that was the cat’s name, according to my love), we booked it onto a bus that tootled us back to the heart of Tokyo.

It turned out that, months before, Tooru had booked us two tickets to a Kabuki performance at a famous establishment known since time immemorial for its spectacles.

The exaggerated storytelling, the spellbinding intricacy of the costumes and the lavish extravagance of the sets transported me to an era of unimaginable decadence and feasts of the mind. It pained my heart to think of the expense Tooru had spent on such an indulgence.

Loitering in the lobby of the theatre after the performance, he snuck a trading card with the main character’s black and white photograph into my hand.

“Women used to carry these around as tokens of their affection. Men probably did, too.” Pulling me to him, he kissed my forehead. “Think nothing of it. You’re worth every penny, Tobio-chan.”

Swelling with an unendurable ache, I threaded my hand in his.

“I love you.” Lost in the hubbub of the crowd, my words evaded his ears.

Night cloaked us in its gathering darkness outside. His hand in mine, Tooru guided me through the labyrinthine concrete jungle of Tokyo after dark. Coming alive, the city shot candid polaroids of its secrets, dealing them out to me with furtive twinkles of the eye.

I watched overworked salarymen tread on one another’s pant legs out of bars; I bumped into high school students lugging grubby backpacks on the way to yet more part-time jobs. I peered into a stuffed ramen joint, cloth banners and faded parchment advertising door-stopping deals in ink, intoxicating aromas billowing from behind the counter as men stared into the abyss of their saké cups before Tooru yanked me along.

I dragged him, muttering, into Kinokuniya. Much different from Book-Off, its secondhand equivalent, this bookstore specialized in new editions. Though I struggled to concentrate on my studies and had learned to hate the expectations saddled on me by books, I loved nothing more than to witness others falling for their allure, the synapses firing with luminous potential in one’s brain. None of my teammates thought to contradict me when I told them their studies, particularly their reading, equaled in importance to practice. None of them thought to call me a hypocrite either. They knew better.

“Your supper awaits, my King of Kings.”

Playfully smacking him, I snapped at Tooru’s heels as he darted out of the bookstore in the direction of our last adventure.

We turned in our sneakers for wooden clogs at the restaurant’s entrance, treading down a narrow hallway strewn with a battered tatami mat. The table, long enough to host a raucous after-work party, accommodated the two of us just the same. Ornate tapestries depicting Showa era battle scenes cascaded along the walls. I found myself spinning from their radiance.

Sitting opposite Tooru, I imagined us returning here years later, hands clasped across the table, surrounded by joyful friends old and young. He smiled, flexing his hands and yawning.

“I need you to understand something, Tobio-chan.”

Bracing against the sudden detachment in his voice, I straightened my shoulders. Unraveling in an endless ribbon of words, all the inevitable pronouncements blared through my head at the same time.

“You’re breaking up with me.” My voice belied my years in its steadiness. A tremor rocked through Tooru’s body from an unseen chill.

“We weren’t together to begin with, so how can I do that to you? You’re too young for a serious relationship. It’s normal, what the two of us went through; young men growing into their identity usually find a friend in a more experienced, older individual. People write stories about that bond all the time.”

So full of mirth and wonder throughout the day, his voice had become hollow. A weariness deadened his bones with a violent rapidity, as though he had exhausted his efforts to keep it at bay. Snatching his hand in mine, I drew his fingers along my lips, kissing each one in turn, tears stinging in my eyes.

“I’ll come back to you when I’m ready. When I’ve lost all this baby fat and I’ve honed in on my shortcomings, you had better believe I’ll still love you like hell.”

Crushing my hand against his cheek, his tears bled between my fingers.

“Promise me.”


	8. The Beginning of An End: Or, Goodbye, Monogamy.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kageyama comes to a big conclusion.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> IT BEGINS.
> 
> Today, I got my last chemo treatment for hodgkin's lymphoma! So, my friends, here is a chapter in honor of this stage of my life coming to a close (and adorable baby Tobio's awakening).
> 
> THANK YOU for READING. I honestly want to follow him into college, so expect that college AU to happen. Reading those is so much fun so writing one will most likely be fun, too. Also, that other sports series cross-over I mentioned? I'll give you a hint: precious baby figure skaters.

“A moment alone with Hinata, please?”

Blindsided by my tone, at once virile and startlingly mature, Oikawa relinquishes his hold, disarming us both with a potent glare.

“I’ll wait outside.”

With a curt nod, I wrap my arm around Hinata’s shoulder, steering him past Tsukishima. For once in his life, the bespectacled ass offers no biting wit to accompany the domestic tableau. My love life, I suppose, renders him a mirror, cursed with reflecting what passes by his glass frame without possessing the words to process all that he witnesses.

Locking the door to the bathroom, I bang my forehead against the stall.

“Hinata, I am beyond sorry.”

He fixes me with a stare, so openhearted and kind, that his eyes alone wear me down until I am an aching vessel of longing.

“You don’t need to explain this, Yamafish. I get it.”

_Yamafish. That nickname. He hasn’t called me that in months. Why now, of all times? Are we time-traveling? Have we met for the first time only moments ago?_

My vision rotates, a top twisted by a sadistic child intent on whirling it out of the space time continuum. Groaning, I grab at my head.

“I’m dating two people,” I say to myself. “I’m fucking in _love_ with two idiots.”

Laughing, Hinata laces his arms in a snug embrace around my waist, his head caressing my heart.

“It’s true what they say; ignorance beats the alternative.”

Robbed of all inhibitions, I snare him in a whirlwind of a kiss, pouring a week’s worth of conjured fantasies into his lips. Coming up for air, he breathes, raking his hands through his unkempt blaze of hair.

“How ‘bout you and us boyfriends check into a love motel?” he says.

Nodding, I grip his hand, plunging headlong into an unknown hinterland of inexpressible hopes.


	9. All Of Us Beginners

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> New character alert. The lack of fanfare is deliberate. It fits with his introduction into the story. SURPRISE. (It's meant as a surprise, at least).

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So we have reached the penultimate chapter. I wrote most of this last night instead of going to sleep. This has more sex than any of the chapters thus far, more romantic indulgences, more everything. Everyone loves Kageyama. I've fallen in love with this story as I've written it so it's not going to end here. This is definitely part one of something bigger.
> 
> I also have the beginning of a Yuri on Ice fic based on a Real Event in my life (my cancer, namely) that I wrote the beginning of this morning, so that'll be posted soon, along with other things. In short, WRITING. 
> 
> THANK YOU FOR READING.

We drive to the nearest love hotel we know, the one in Hakata near where I had my fateful first encounter with Tooru. Throughout the entire ride, he steals glances at passing cars on the freeway, occasionally switching on the radio to a 24/7 news channel.

Next to him, I concentrate on breathing, wringing my hands. Massaging my shoulders, Hinata reels in his usual cheerful babble.

Oppressive in its intent, to erase the implications of my bringing someone new into our life together, Tooru’s silence bites away at him like a cat toying with a mouse before the kill.

In the lobby of the love hotel while Hinata checks us in at the front desk, I yank Tooru into an alcove near a neon vending machine.

“Did you forget what you told me? I belong to myself. Not you.”

“Yeah,” he says, “but no way in hell did I expect _this_.” Beams of red flare in my eyes, obscuring my vision. Tendrils of panic trail up my back.

“If you still love me, you’re gonna need to live with it.” His hand clenches, and I flinch before he crushes his fingers into his palm, an ugly thought twisting his face into a haggard ruin of itself.

“I’m through with waiting. Watching your last game, it about knocked me dead, the thought of keeping it up until you’d lived half of your life. You’re so beyond your old self; if my feelings get the best of me and I end this again, I swear to God, Tobio, I’ll drink until I walk into traffic.”

He leans his forehead on mine, and I sink into him. Currents of half-forgotten dreams surge back into memories, becoming kisses, enclosing us in an ocean of fathomless blue.

“Yo, I got us a room!”

Breathing back a storm of thirst, Tooru scolds him, all the while fastening his gaze on me.

“You’re way too happy about this, Shrimpy,” he says. I snort. Thanks to a certain bespectacled menace, the default response has grown on me.

“Of course I am! We’re graduating in a year. We gotta make the most of it.”

 _Right_. _College_. _The rest of our lives_.

Holding their hands in mine, I crystalize the exact moment in time when I realize that within my heart exists an ocean of love.

* * *

 By the sheer momentum of piecing our lives as one together, the three of us scrape by until the date of Hinata’s and my graduation arrives.

Before saying farewell to the godly legend we have made of Karasuno, we step into our superior’s places, Daichi-san having provided us with positions of authority upon his own departure. Yamaguchi, a talented athlete in his own right, relishes in the opportunities his new placement affords him, insisting we continue playing as a team on weekends.

Picking up where we left off at the shelter, Tsukishima evolves into a companion, the two of us eventually staying after hours in the study rooms of the library, him helping keep me afloat by teaching me the beauty found in math and science.

In moments of silence, we share headphones, holding hands.

At the end of the year, after our graduation ceremony, waiting for everyone to finish posing for our impromptu team photoshoot, I write him a brief text:

 **3:16PM**  
**Me**  
_You keep surprising me_. _Keep doing it_.

Figuring he’s celebrating with Yamaguchi and their families, I breathe inwardly with relief, giddy with the anticipation of a response.

“I know that face,” Hinata says, barely holding back a giggle as Noya and Tanaka launch into a tremulous rendition of Owaranai Uta. “You fall in love again?” Casting him a sidelong look, I rub his head and nibble on his earlobe.

“You can’t pin down what we’ve got going on with a word yet.”  
Hinata’s grown, nearly taller than me now, toned and arrestingly lovely in the safety of his skin. So too have I, my hair darker and neater, my eyes open now to the abundance of the world’s offerings turned a bottomless blue.

“I adore that about you. Never change, Kageyams.”

 _Kageyams_. _That’s a new one_.

It’s always a new day with him.

* * *

 Later that evening, coming out of the shower, I hear my phone beep. I pick it up from my bed.

My heart flutters. I’m thirteen again.

**9:20pm**

**Dorkshima**

_Plan on it_.

He calls me the next day.

* * *

 Hinata and I enroll in cram school over the summer, forgetting sleep, studying at one or the other’s houses until we can no longer weep for want of water. We pledge to not allow ourselves the same amount of negligence throughout the year. Not that either of us can afford an excuse, us living in the same dorm and all.

Dawn sheds its watercolor palette over the sky when Tooru comes over to my house from late work-out sessions at the gym. We grow into a routine, cooking frighteningly unhealthy meals to entrancing dance music, documentaries on black holes and extraterrestrial life feeding on our brainwaves from his laptop.

Most mornings, we end up waking on the living room sofa, our clothes strewn about the floor, so intertwined that we often end up befuddled as to the contortionist-like quality of our limbs.

Sometimes, Hinata and Tsukishima walk in on us in this state, both of them laughing, albeit the latter in a throaty cough that succeeds in watering my mouth.

Over the phone, Tsukishima confides in me that he’s heading to a prestigious university in a bustling metropolis. We part without finality, an unchanging coil of possibilities unraveling before us.

* * *

 Halfway through our first year of college, Tsukishima shows up at the suite I share with Shouyou and, sometimes, our upperclassman Ushijima Wakatoshi. He’s usually out, to our mutual chagrin, enlightening others with his enviable company.

“How’d you find our number?” I say.

“Ushijima. Ran into him hours ago on the hill walking down. Jesusfuck. Walking up that behemoth murdered my legs.”

I can’t tell. He’s let his hair grow longer, flaring out into silver-tongued cherubic waves over vintage black frames. Hugged by a black fleece sweater and dove grey corduroy jeans, he’s asking for a hipster taunt. But I struggle to formulate a joke, mesmerized.

“I’m sorry, Tobio,” he says.

A year and a half ago, hearing my name in all of its nakedness from him would have cut into my head, unleashing venom on my brain. Now, it sounds natural.

“You’re forgiven. I’m on the spectrum. You’re aware. Let’s live our lives.”

I’m living with my autism. I’m talking on the phone. I’m hugging people (Ushijima often enough that Tooru says the elephant in the room needs addressing). I say my favorite color, blue, soothes me when my dreams become nightmares.

More than that, it reminds me of my inner life, how I cannot stop the tide of love from falling over me, over my life and the lives of those with whom I share it.

Reflecting, I study Tsukishima’s back as he gloats over the pristine condition of our kitchen, sink free of dishes, kitten-coated dishtowels hanging from the refrigerator rack.

“Don’t tell me. You’ve got chores and shit.” I nod, though he can’t see me. “I’m not missing the domestic bliss. Straight up makes me vomit.” Lacing his hand in mine, I crawl my fingers up his elbow.

With an inviting smirk, he flattens his free palm over the sink, easing my hand down, down.

“Are we a kitchen fuck cliché,” he says, laughing.

“You’d better believe it.” He grunts, a clear-eyed vulnerability awash in the creases of his forehead.

“Classic Tobio,” he says, his voice cracking. “So unoriginal.”

Shutting us both up, he curls his hand around the elastic band of my boxers, nipping at the crescent of my bottom lip.

“Guess how long I’ve waited for this,” he says, his voice muffled as I crinkle the soft folds of his sweater over his head. Once off, he nestles the garment in a messy pile on the kitchen island.

“I think I’d die laughing if you told me,” I say.

“Fuck me; I still hate you. Newsflash.”

I’m scrabbling for words, enfolded in a whirlpool of wonderment. His body, chiseled and honed to a Grecian perfection, slumps in selfless ignorance.

Level with my gaze, he curls my shirt over my head, gasping with mock astonishment.

“Why’re you still so gorgeous?” he says, straddling the line of deadpan and something raw, tender.

“Ask yourself that dumbass question.” He snorts.

How I’ve missed that sound.

The door, with a falsetto creak, opens, followed by Shouyou and a drenched Tooru. Clad in his rumpled striped gym shorts and his Aoba Jousai jersey, he’s definitely come straight from working out with Iwaizumi-san.

“Showering. Don’t you dare start without me, you lot.” Without further comment, he glides down the front hall to the bathroom, humming a jaunty anime tune in perfect pitch.

“This must happen a shit-ton,” Tsukishima says, removing his glasses with two trembling fingers.

“Not much.” Dumping Chinese buns in plastic containers on the island, Shouyou mops beads of sweat from his forehead. “We don’t like making Ushijima uncomfortable with our lovey dovey business, so we keep it under control.”

As per Tooru’s request, Tsukishima and I wait until he reemerges, hair glossy and blown dry. Knowing he cannot possibly conduct his regular skype date with our team captain and mom in this charged environment, Shouyou barricades himself in our room with his laptop.

Minutes later, Tooru, Tsukishima and I engage in what may constitute as our most shameless act of debauchery yet.

At its end, Tsukishima, a spent shell of himself, sprawls across the living room floor in a state of rhapsodic ectasy.

As for Tooru and I, we immerse ourselves in the undertaking of aftercare, locating our mutual top and bottom’s pool table green Dogs Playing Poker boxers and unloading the Chinese dumplings from their containers, Tooru bringing a piping hot plate to Shouyou.

“What you heard earlier, it’s true,” I say, helping Tsukishima stretch the soreness from his legs. “We dare not include Ushijima in our amorous rites for fear of him erasing us from his life.”

Closing the door to Shouyou’s and my room, Tooru barks out a laugh.

“In all honesty, I would prefer it if you did,” a soft voice says.

Devolving into a blob of spluttering profanity, Tsukishima makes a futile attempt to yank on his sweater and jeans in one go.

Propped against the door to his room, Ushijima’s eyes drink me up and down like a tall one. Swelled with sleep, they burn on fierce fumes of a hunger I know well.

“Understand this,” he says, his penetrating gaze shifting in turn from Tooru to Tsukishima. “For one whole month out of the year, Kageyama shares with me: my food, my friends, and above all, my bed.”

Laughter bubbles up Tooru’s throat until an inquiring eyebrow strangles it dead. To my immediate bafflement, Tsukishima nods.

“Acquiesce,” Ushijima says, eyes glistening with a fierce resolve. Backing away, I misremember my feet, hobbling over the sofa. “Otherwise, this whole polyamorous dynasty can beg on its knees for my mercy.” His gaze flits back to mine. “Barring you, Kageyama, of course. Well, I’m hitting the sack. Good night.”

Shutting the door behind him, a sharp intake of breath sounds through the keyhole.

* * *

  _So this_ , I say to myself, standing outside his door in my customary flannel pyjamas and uncaring hoodie,  _is the sort of person you have become_.

Murmuring a prayer under my breath, I let myself inside.


	10. Big Question

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for tagging along with me on this journey. Again, this will not end here. Expect more from this universe.

_One Year Later_

_“Tell us something you haven’t told your parents yet.”_

_The two boys running the LGBT Support Group on campus gave one the impression of knowing one another better than they knew themselves. Leading the group was an agile, effortlessly handsome young man with a flaming shock of hair and an easy smile. Beside him sat a dark-haired beauty with eyes that plunged into the depths of the soul, halting the breath._

_The group, made up of three girls and two boys, cast dubious looks at one another and squirmed in their seats._

_“You don’t have to share if you’re uncomfortable, of course,” the leader said._

_“I’ll go.”_

_Surprising everyone but himself, the dark-haired boy took a deep breath._

_“My name’s Kageyama,” he said. “I keep a good deal of secrets from my parents. They don’t know, for instance, that this time last year I dated four people at the same time. I’m not now, if you wanted to know. It messed me up; it was way too emotionally compromising for me to handle. But! I was happy. I know that must sound strange, but it was the most challenging and invigorating thing I’ve ever done besides trying to get good grades in math and science classes. And if the opportunity presented itself, I would probably do it again.”_

_One of the girls, a petite redhead with shining green glasses, cleared her throat. “Isn’t that level of promiscuity in one person frowned upon?” she said._

_Stiffening, the leader opened his mouth to speak, but before he managed to interrupt, the dark-haired boy continued._

_“So a couple weeks back, I watched this drama called School 2013. If you haven’t seen it, I thoroughly recommend it. But anyway, in this one scene, a teacher and a student are talking about love. And the teacher says to the student something along the lines of the frequency with which a person falls in love speaks to their kindness as a human being.”_

_This time, the collective sigh that traveled the room evoked the time-consuming process of a thought sequestering itself in the brain._

_“I’ll put the question to the group, then,” the dark-haired boy said, speaking above his normal level. “What, exactly, is so wrong about kindness?”_


End file.
